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OTTAWA — The Prime Minister’s Office and the Conservative party say a secretive fund operated out of the PMO to pay for political party costs was not used to cover Nigel Wright’s $90,000 secret payment to Mike Duffy for improper Senate expenses.

District Court Judge Royce Lamberth’s dismissal of some of the lawsuits filed by Fannie Mae (FNMA) and Freddie Mac (FMCC) investors, has led the non-Treasury stakeholders to turn to the Court of Federal Claims.

WASHINGTON — The number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment benefits dropped from a six-month high last week, but remained elevated as California continued to deal with a backlog related to computer problems.
Initial claims for state unemployment benefits fell 15,000 to a seasonally adjusted 358,000, the Labor Department said on Thursday. Economists polled by Reuters had expected first-time applications to rise to 335,000 last week.

OTTAWA — The Conservative party called Friday for the retraction of a report saying a secret partisan fund is run by the Prime Minister’s Office.
The party called the report false, and says it pays for all of the prime minister’s political expenses — and not out of a hidden bank account.
“All Conservative party expenses are paid by one account, controlled by the Conservative party,” the party said in a statement.
“All funds are properly reported to Elections Canada and audited annually.”

Fund investors face paying income tax on “loyalty bonuses” paid by fund supermarkets from next week after HM Revenue & Customs ruled that the payments are “annual payments” and should therefore be taxed as income, starting in the new tax year – April 6.
Hargreaves Lansdown, the largest payer of loyalty bonuses on funds in the UK, called it “anti-competitive” and said it was a “worrying precedent” that could spread to other forms of cashback, such as those on supermarket loyalty schemes and credit cards.